We’ve been home from Africa for 11 months, but we just got a new reminder of the trip – a replica mount of Hanna’s 14 lb. tigerfish from the Lower Zambezi River. In just five years, we’ve gone from no taxidermy to five specimens – my 12 lb. largemouth, each of our personal best peacock bass, a very special Montana cutthroat, and now this toothy African beast.

They’re all works of art, but this one might be the ultimate. The good folks at Advanced Taxidermy in Canada took care to make every element, down to each tooth and each individual scale, as realistic as possible. Befitting that status, we removed another piece of artwork from above our mantel and put this one in prime position. It’s the first thing that catches your eye when you walk in the front door, and it grabs you again when you walk to the steps to go upstairs, and likewise when you first come down.

I don’t know what we could catch and replicate that would be more visually arresting, but in order to keep up the “five in five years” pace, we’re going to have to work pretty hard, and play even harder.